If elected governor, Graham says Florida would stick with Paris climate accord

TALLAHASSEE — Democrat Gwen Graham said Tuesday that as governor she would implement a renewable energy requirement for utilities and work towards legislation allowing third-party sales of electricity.

Graham announced her climate plan on Tuesday following President Donald Trump's decision last week to withdraw the United States from the Paris Accord on climate change.

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If elected, she said she will have Florida would join other states upholding the accord. Graham said Florida already is suffering the threats of climate change, including rising sea levels, droughts and forest fires.

"Yet, despite all the science and even plain old common sense, President Donald Trump is embracing disaster by withdrawing our country from the Paris agreement," Graham said. "Let me be blunt: Ignoring climate change will drown Florida's future."

Graham, a former Democratic member of Congress from Tallahassee, said, that as governor, she will ban fracking, the oil and gas extraction process also known as hydraulic fracturing. And she said Florida will build a "clean energy economy."

In her announcement, she said she will implement a renewable energy standard that makes Florida less reliant on fossil fuels, while continuing President Barack Obama's federal carbon emissions rule called the "Clean Power Plan."

Under Attorney General Pam Bondi, Florida has joined other states challenging the rule in federal court, which Bondi says would be costly to consumers. Trump on May 28 signed an executive order to begin the lengthy process of rescinding the rule.

Graham said she will implement a renewable energy standard for utilities but didn't say whether she would do so without authorization from the Legislature. In 2007, then-Gov. Charlie Crist directed the Public Service Commission to implement such a standard, but the Legislature later blocked the move.

Graham said she also would work with Republican and Democratic legislators to allow homeowners to enter into power purchase agreements. Florida is one of nine states that does not allow those third-party sales and proposed law changes have not be heard in the Legislature.

And Graham said she would appoint consumer advocates and others "who believe in science" to the Public Service Commission "to give solar companies a chance at competition with the corporate utilities."

Last week, Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, another Democratic candidate for governor, focused on Trump, Scott and the 2015 accusation that the governor's administration banned the phrase "climate change." Later, in comments to reporters, Gillum also knocked Graham for voting for the Keystone XL pipeline in Congress..

The Florida Democratic Party last month questioned Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam, who is seeking the Republican nomination for governor, for deflecting a question about climate change by saying that any policy "should be federal in nature."

There was no immediate response on Tuesday to Graham's announcement from the Putnam campaign or the Republican Party of Florida.